Mae West - William Shakespeare & As You Like It 2012 TV - Norman Wisdom - Noel Coward - Orson Welles - Oscar Wilde - Roundhead or Cavalier: Which One Are You? TV - Tom Stoppard - P S Baber - Sean O’Casey - Peter Ackroyd - Arthur Conan Doyle -
Personality is the glitter that sends your little gleam across the footlights and the orchestra pit into that big black space where the audience is. Mae West
Life’s but a walking shadow, a poor player
That struts and frets his hour upon the stage,
And then is heard no more. It is a tale
Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury,
Signifying nothing. William Shakespeare, The Tragedy of Macbeth V v 22 Macbeth
A stage where every man must play a part,
And mine a sad one. William Shakespeare, The Merchant of Venice I i, Antonio
Duke Senior: Thou seest we are not all alone unhappy.
This wide and universal theatre.
Presents more woeful pageants than the scene
Wherein we play in.
Jaques: All the world’s a stage,
And all the men and women merely players:
They have their exits and their entrances;
And one man in his time plays many parts,
His acts being seven ages. William Shakespeare, As You Like It II vii @135
All the world’s a stage, and all the men and women merely players. As You Like It, Globe Theatre, Sky Arts 2012, Jaques
I spent virtually all of those years on the road. You could keep incredibly busy just performing in pantomimes and revues. There was a whole generation of performers who learned everything on the stage. Norman Wisdom
Don’t put your daughter on the stage, Mrs Worthington,
Don’t put your daughter on the stage. Noel Coward, Mrs Worthington, 1935 song
I took the easy way. I went on the stage ... Began at the top and have been working my way down ever since. Orson Welles, F for Fake, 1974
The world is a stage, but the play is barely cast. Oscar Wilde
30,901. Parliament issued an order for the utter suppression and abolition of all stage plays. Roundhead or Cavalier: Which One Are You? BBC 2012
We do on stage things that are supposed to happen off. Which is a kind of integrity, if you look on every exit as being an entrance somewhere else. Tom Stoppard, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead
The stage is a magic circle where only the most real things happen, a neutral territory outside the jurisdiction of Fate where stars may be crossed with impunity. A truer and more real place does not exist in all the universe. P S Baber, Cassie Draws the Universe
All the world’s a stage and most of us are desperately unrehearsed. Seán O'Casey
Chaucer is the father of our poetry; Shakespeare is the father of our stage. Peter Ackroyd, The Lambs of London p35
The stage lost a fine actor, even as science lost an acute reasoner, when [Holmes] became a specialist in crime. Arthur Conan Doyle, The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes